Former prime minister Malcolm Turnbull after delivering an address at the NSW Smart Energy Summit in which he mocked Coalition members pushing for coal-fired power stations as bereft of the facts.
Photograph: Dan Himbrechts/AAP

The former prime minister Malcolm Turnbull has again taken aim at “the insurgents” – a small group of Coalition MPs who “torpedoed” his efforts to introduce the national energy guarantee, and his prime ministership.

Speaking at the New South Wales Smart Energy Summit in Sydney on Tuesday, Turnbull defended his record, lauding Snowy Hydro 2.0 and lamenting the demise of the Neg.

“There was a small group who were prepared to cross the floor, blow up the government in order to get their way. So, it is a – it is, at the moment, given the politics within the respective party rooms, it is very, very hard to reach a resolution on this,” he said.

“Now, I have to say, I gave this my best shot. We got support from the states, we got support from industry, we got support from obviously the cabinet, got support from the party room on three occasions. Majority support. Never unanimous support.

“But in a House of Representatives where you had a majority of one, which is what we had at the time, obviously a small minority can effect enormous leverage. And that, you know, that is – that is a candid explanation of the challenge.

“There are a significant number of members who do not believe in climate change, who would like to get out of Paris and who would rather build a new coal-fired power station,” he said.

“Barnaby Joyce made that helpful suggestion in the last week of the Wentworth byelection,” he said.

“They are prepared to cross the floor, blow up the government, so it’s very hard to reach a resolution in the party room.”

“This is not a religious issue,” he said of the question of whether to prefer renewables over coal-fired generation.

Turnbull mocked those pushing for coal-fired power stations as being driven by “ideology and idiocy”, saying they were bereft of the facts on the cost of coal generation compared with renewables. “It has to be grounded in economics and engineering,” he said. “We know that we need to decarbonise.”

Turnbull praised Julie Bishop for trying to reignite interest in the Neg, warning that without it “I fear we will end up with higher prices and higher emissions.”

He criticised the leaking of a private conversation with the state Liberal MP Matt Kean in which Turnbull was reported to have said Morrison just wanted to “keep his arse in C1” [ the PM’s car] for as long as possible.

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“The background to that was on Sunday I spoke to a number of members of the state executive. And I, as anyone is entitled to, particularly as a member of the Liberal party, and I said the preselection process should go ahead in the electorate of Hughes and the Liberal party members of Hughes should have their say as to who their candidate should be. Right? That was my view.

“At least one of the people I spoke to chose to share a very colourful and not entirely accurate version of that discussion with the media,” he said.

Turnbull said no one had suggested he should be expelled from the party.

Asked by a member of the audience whether he would support independents who opposed Liberals who did not believe in climate change, Turnbull said he had been a member of the Liberal party most of his life, and he hoped the party would adjust its stance.

He called on voters to realise that state Liberal governments in NSW, Tasmania and South Australia were different to the federal party and were getting on with the transition to renewables.

“I mean, my regret about the national energy guarantee not going ahead is that we came so close to having, for the first time in a long time, you know, a consensus on a national energy policy. And, of course, that provides the certainty that enables investment to occur,” Turnbull said.